What the Art Teacher Wore #126 and Ghosts of Christmas Past

Christmas Tablecloth to Lady Skirt Monday: This bad boy is easily one of my fave vintage Christmas finds. Upon close inspection, I do believe it's prolly from a late 1960's DIY kit. It's all glue, felt, fringe and sequence which is simply my kinda party. sweater: vintage, thrifted; belt: Pin Up Girl Clothing; skirt DIY: deets here, y'all; tights: prolly Target; boots: Lucky Brand score from Marshall's

Well, hello, friends! Are you feeling as frazzled -n- fried as I am?  It's the most Wonderful(ly) Wacky time of the year, amirite?  Thankfully, there's a light at the end of the tunnel (or is that just a Christmas tree I see?) in the form of two weeks off! My apologies to those of you who don't have the luxury of sitting around in your pjs whilst eating ice cream outta the carton and catching back episodes of Project Runway for 14 consecutive dayzzz. Your mama done tole you to become an art teacha, ya shoulda listened. Now if only I can muscle my way through these last 4.25 school days and conquer that mountain known as my To-Do list, I'll be well on my way to sloth-doom. 

Now, I gotta tell ya, I'm like way behind on some blog posts. I've got a lil backlog of art projects, DIYs and Christmas-themed whut-nots to share with y'all. So, for that reason, I have decided to post everyday for the next 10 days on this here blog. That's right, you heard me. AND I plan to have a giveaway EVERY.SINGLE.DAY. Because I'm feeling all Christmas-y and giving-ish. So! Please be sure to report back here tomorrow to find out all the free-goodie goodness that I've got in store for you over the next 10 days.

Until tomorrow, here's a lil peak at some DIY's of Christmas past with linky-loo's and how-to's for your craft-astic pleasure. Hope y'all have a great week and I'll see you tomorrow!

 A coupla years back, I got on this painting-from-vintage-postcards kick. I found this sweet image on pinterest, sketched it out and painted on canvas. Every year I place it on my (rarely used) painting easel along with that house I painted (found the wooden cut out of the house at the thrift store years ago). A sweet parent gifted me the Merry Christmas sign one year and I love how it goes with everything perfectly. Says me. All the Christmas-y details here, friends. 

 Yet Another Tablecloth Gives It's Life for a Tackitastic Cause Tuesday: I shared this debatable beaut with you earlier this week. I still loved it regardless of what the holiday-haters say. By the way, do y'all like my one-legged flamingo pose? What in the world...? top: vintage, thrifted; skirt and headband: made by me, details here; shoes: Converse

 Yet another Christmas painting I copied and painted a coupla years back. I've since added a big red and white stripped bow to the top. Inspo was a vintage ad. All the snore-y details here. 

 My Kind of Christmas Colors Wednesday: I love pink and turquoise. Together. Forever. One day when I retire, I'll live in an Airstream trailer, complete with pink and turq interior and I'll pull it behind my big fat vintage pink caddy. I'm serious, y'all. That'd be livin the dream. sweater and tights: Target; big belt: Amazon; cuckoo clock dress: made by me, details here

When I finished off that cuckoo clock dress, I found I had a ton of tiny and, so I thought, useless scraps laying around. Bein' the hoarder that I am, I couldn't handle throwing 'em out. So I kept 'em thinking I'd come up with something to do with them. Which is where the idea to create ornaments with the remnants came from. 

 Light Up Dress Thursday: Oh, when created this dress a couple Christmases ago, it forever cursed me. Since it's creation, the kids are all, "yeah, your new dress is cool and all BUT DOES IT LIGHT UP?!" sweater: thrifted; belt: Pin Up Girl Clothing (guess who likes belts from Pin Up Girl Clothing...?!); crinoline: Amazon; light up Christmas dress: made be me, go here; Santa shoes: visit here 

A coupla years ago, my school began what has since become our annual Tacky Christmas Sweater Day. I attacked an otherwise innocent thrifted leopard print number with (totes itchy) garland and dominated with my tackiness. View it here, friends. This year, my school is doing something a lil different. Because we are doing a Be Nice campaign at our school, we decided that teachers and students should "pay" to be tacky in the form of pet supplies that will be donated to the local animal shelter. Super nice, right? We thought so. It's this Tuesday, wish me luck!

Big Fat Christmas Skirt Friday: Whoever originally created this tree skirt sure did put in their time. It's totally embroidered and just so vintage-y sweet. Let's hope they never find out what I've done to the poor thing! vintage sweater: thrifted; tree skirt to lady skirt: here

What's a Tacky Sweater Day without being rewarded for your efforts, hmmm? Here are the rewards I created in the past. WHICH were handed out after school hours, just in care you are wondering. I've gotta dream up new ones for this Tuesday. No worries, I'll share 'em with ya. Until then, see ya tomorrow! 

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DIY: A Splatter-Paintin'/Jackson Pollock-y Hybrid Dress

Oh mah goodness, the dress that's been haunting my sewing room for ages is finally complete! Paired with my DIY palette hair clip and some sparkly flats from Anthropologie.

I'll have you know that I'm one of those super duper annoying people that tells the same joke over and over. AND, if you don't laugh the first time, Ima gonna assume it's not because you don't find me highly entertaining, it's just that your ears are broken and you're kinda dumb. Therefore, said not-worthy-of-a-laugh joke will be repeated, this time only louder and slower for your listening (dis)pleasure.

Dudes, when am I gonna learn to work this lil point-n-shoot camera of mine correctly? I mean, this photo's got more grain that a bowl of FiberOne.

Case in point: When I wore this dress on our final day of Painting Processes in the art room. Details of that Super Happy Fun Insanity to come but until then, lemme break it down for ya: 20 children + paint + instruments of mass painting destruction = one awesomely painted mess.  So my repeated joke of choice to anyone who happened to venture into the art room mid-madness? 

"My dress was actually white this morning!"

When my hilarity was met with a blank stare, I restated my standup routine this time explaining my joke. Because that always helps:

"You know. It was white. And then it got paint on it. [unchanged blank stare = digging myself into an even bigger unfunny joke hole] Because, with all the glue huffing, the kids went kinda bonkers, tied me down and splattered paint all over me."

And just when I think I mighta gotten through to Super-Slow-Joke-Getter, some kid'll blow it and shout across the room, "Nuh huh! We don't even know how to tie!"

While I'm pretty pleased with the fit and finish, I'm not loving the wrinkled look of the red midriff. Whassup? I'm guessin my interfacing should not have been an adhesive one. My thought is that the adhesive is causing the midriff to wrinkle. What do you think, sewing sistahs?

Yeah. So I guess I won't be quittin' my day job and takin' my standup out on the road. Cuz knowing my luck, I'd have my students in the audience razzing me the whole time. Which is kinda like my everyday life. Seriously! In fact, just yesterday when I said, "Okay, kids, it's time to start cleaning up." One of my fourth graders raised his hand and said:

"Mrs. Stephens, we don't clean on Fridays. We have the day off. Sorry."

I. Get. No. Respect.

Le sigh. Let's chat about this new dress o' mine shall we? Before I fall into a deep dark nobody-likes-me/everybody-hates-me/why-don't-I-just-eat-dirt depression. I got the notion that I needed some Back-to-School dresses and scooped several yards of this splattery fabric a month ago. I quickly began working on the bodice using this well-loved Simplicity pattern of mine.

 

Then I decided to break up all that splattery goodness a bit. For this idea, I used the wide waist band from my vintage Simplicity pattern. After the bodice was complete, I seriously had 6 yards of the fabric left. Just enough to try my hand at my very first circle skirt with that vintage Butterick pattern on the right. With the use of three patterns, it's like a ménage à trois dress. But without the awkward sleeping arrangement.

Can you believe the size of this thing?! I loved that I didn't have to mess with any gathering business as I've done with so many other dresses...until I had to hem this beast. And I wasn't about to do that by hand. Are you kidding me? I ran that thing through my machine as fast as I could and it still took me up to an hour to complete.

I'm thinking I need a brand new, extra fluffy crinoline to showcase the endless yards of splattery goodness, don't you think?

 

Because this fabric totally has a Jackson Pollock thing happening, I got this crazy notion to create a dress for each of our Artists of the Month. If you recall, I created this little number when the kids were learning about Hokusai last month and now I've got this Pollock-y frock complete. The only prob? Andy Warhol is our featured artist this month! Which means I've got some work to do...but at least I've got Pollock ready when his month comes up. My goal by the end of the school year is to have created 10 artist-themed dresses. Wish me luck, ya'll.

Oh! And those Painting Processes I was telling you about? Well, here's what the art room tables looked like before...

...and by the end of the day. Take a close look at that once-white table covering. Looks just like the fabric of my dress, doncha think? Next time, I'm just throwing some white cotton cloth on the tables, ya'll.

At the rate the kids are going, I'll have enough fabric to create several of these Splatter-Paintin'/Jackson Pollock-y dresses. Stay tuned for more details of our Painting Processes in the art room. Until then, have a fantasticly splatterific week!

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